Caught In The Crossfire
by dethklok1
Summary: We all know how the Burning Legion horribly impacted the lives of the Draenei, but none of us know personally the emotional trauma it caused for them. This is the story of a man whose life was destroyed because of the demon menace.


So, long story short.

It all started on our home planet, Argus. The evil leader of the Burning Legion came to my three leaders, Archimonde, Kil'Jaeden, and Velen. As far as I know, he introduced himself as the immortal Sargeras but came in a mortal body, who my people later found out was a man named Medivh. In my opinion, Medivh could've been a great hero had not Sargeras overtaken his body and corrupted his soul. He might have aided us in our fight. But, this is speculation, and entirely besides the point.

He offered my leaders eternal power and greatness, but, as with everything too good to be true, it came with a horrid price, and that price was to sell my people, the Eredar, into slavery. Apparently, two of these three men were too arrogant to see this. After Sargeras left them to contemplate, they turned to each other to decide as a group the fate of their people. Kil'Jaeden and Archimonde were completely sold out to this idea. Eternal power? _Oh hell yes. _Eternal slavery? _Who gives a damn?_

Velen did, obviously, or I wouldn't be here to write this brief history for you… That is, whoever actually cares enough to read what a sad little Draenei wrote.

Anyway.

Velen, from the beginning, had doubts about this man. Sargeras. Sar. Ger. As. Something about him seemed a little screwy to Velen. I wasn't there, so I wouldn't know exactly. But from what Velen has told me, something was wrong about his aura, the way his tongue wound around the words spoken… Just his mere presence, I suppose. But, like I said, I wasn't there. Frankly, I'm glad.

The only way I will see Sargeras if is he is laying in a pool of his own blood, coughing and sputtering on various fluids and bile, utterly suffering for what he did to me, my people, and Anri.

Anri Sohaar.

It has a nice ring to it, don't you think?

Ah, I'm getting off track again. So where was I? Oh yes, the trio's conversation.

Kil'Jaeden and Archimonde agreed that what Sargeras had proposed was the best thing that could ever happen to the Eredar, _ever_. Velen still had doubts. He didn't really trust Sargeras, and that mistrust would only grow throughout his conversation with the other two Eredar. Velen was a bit taken aback by the way they agreed so quickly, how much they trusted this mysterious demonic leader. He had known them for centuries. They were his best friends, especially Kil'Jaeden. They were never so quick to decide on anything, and now this. What had gotten into them?

Velen voiced his concern to his friends, and they wrote it off as mere nervousness. Everything would be better once they joined Sargeras, they said. They would have nothing to worry about, they would have ultimate power, everything would be absolutely awesome, et cetera. Pure garbage coming out of the mouths of two of the most respected Eredar at the time.

So, the trio departed. Velen made his way to a sacred temple of my people which housed the ata'mal crystal. The triangular crystal was so old that no Eredar could remember its origin. But legend had it that it was a gift given to us long ago, by whom no one could tell. It was a very powerful crystal, often used for healing, conjuration, and visions. That's what Velen hoped to do, just so he could make sure that his best friends were right and he was overreacting.

He sat down in front of the crystal and started to meditate. As I said before, I wasn't there, and I wasn't the one having the vision. But Velen described it to me in detail after he called me to his place in the Exodar, which, as you should know, is my peoples' capital city…but it used to be a spaceship.

Yeah, you heard me. A spaceship.

Anyway. This is what Velen told me, word for word, because I will never forget the fear and rage in his shaking voice.

"At first, what I saw seemed only to confirm what Sargeras had promised," he told me on that sad evening, "I saw myself standing with Archimonde and Kil'Jaeden, lords not only of our own noble and proud people but of countless other worlds. Power shimmered around us, power that I knew would be as intoxicating as any liquor you or I might sip. Shining cities were ours, along with the inhabitants of those cities, prostrating themselves before us with cheers and cries of adoration and loyalty. Technology such as I had never dreamed of awaited my exploration. Tomes in strange tongues were translated for me, revealing magic hitherto unimagined and untold. It was glorious, and my heart swelled.

"I turned to look at Kil'Jaeden, and my old friend smiled. Archimonde put a friendly hand on my shoulder.

"Then I looked down at myself…and cried out in horror."

Here, he closed his eyes for a second and shuddered. Whatever I would hear next was going to be awful, and I knew it.

"My body was now gargantuan, but twisted and distorted. Smooth blue skin was now black and brown and gnarled, like some once-noble tree disfigured by disease. Light radiated from me, true, but not the pure light of powerful, positive energy, but a sickly green. Frantically I turned to behold my friends, my fellow leaders and Eredar. They, too, had been transformed. They, too, retained nothing of what they had been but were now…

"_Man'ari_."

I knew the word all to well by then. Man'ari. Those damn demons that destroyed my life, the lives of all Draenei, and the life of one I held very dear to me… I still do.

He didn't, or couldn't, tell me the rest of the story for he had already become distraught. I tried to comfort him, but the Light knows I'm not one to comfort. After sitting in silence for a few minutes, I got up, bowed to Velen, and left. I couldn't bear it.

After his vision, Velen called for his two friends. He reached out with his mind and showed them what he had been shown, and hoped that they would join him in declining Sargeras' awful propositions.

But they disagreed. They told him it was not a vision, but merely his imagination playing tricks on him. Velen was pained from their decision, but played along so they would not notice that he still doubted their new lord. Velen knew that if he disagreed, there would be deadly consequences.

So, over the next few days, while Kil'Jaeden and Archimonde prepared for Sargeras' coming, Velen gathered up a few of his people and convinced them to escape from slavery while they still could. They knew that Velen was right, for he was always the more cautious of their leaders. They swore to follow him to escape from this demon.

But, escape where?

The day after his conversation with Archimonde and Kil'Jaeden, he had gone to meditate at the ata'mal crystal again. From there, a being spoke to him through his mind; the Naaru K'ure.

Ah, the Naaru. The most pure of beings in all of the universe. Bringers of the Holy Light, saviors of countless races, including my own. Although sometimes I wonder why the Light didn't save Anri.

Again, besides the point.

K'ure told Velen to come with his followers to the tip of the highest mountain on our planet. He would then save us, somehow. He would save us, no matter what. He knew that Sargeras was bad news.

So, on the day that he specified, we all came with Velen to the mountaintop. This time, I was there, along with my family; my mother, father, and little sister. My friends were also there, although not all of them. I always knew that Sacrolash and Alytess were destined for darkness.

We were almost caught by our former leaders, but K'ure saved us using the ata'mal crystal. To this day, I cannot thank him enough…or her…or…

Honestly, I have no idea what gender any Naaru are.

Anyway. K'ure had formed some kind of spaceship that was made of a material I had never seen or heard of. It was… How should I put this? I don't know, it was soft. Like a blanket.

Unfortunately, there were only about one hundred escaped Eredar. Since our group was so small to begin with, we suffer for it even today. We do not have children very often because we are so long-lived. Velen was well into his thousands when we left Argus, and today he is well over twenty-five thousand. Even so he shows no sign of age, besides, you know, the Greatfather Winter beard.

So, almost as soon as we left, we renamed our people so we could be distinguished from the terrible Man'ari. Our new name was Draenei, meaning "exiled ones" in our native tongue. In our ship we traveled to many different worlds, probably hundreds - all of them destroyed by the Burning Legion, led by Sargeras. Kil'Jaeden had become his right hand, Archimonde his left. It was as if they were keeping tabs on us, which many of us believe they were.

Then, one miraculous day, we found a nice little planet that very much resembled our own. We arrived on the planet and built a few small settlements. After living there for a while and being unharmed and unbothered by the Burning Legion, we built a city out of a bit of the ship. We named the planet Draenor, meaning "exile's refuge." The rest of our ship went unused, and eventually was overrun with the beautiful flora and fauna of Draenor.

Soon, we discovered a native people to this planet. We approached with caution and soon came to know them as the Orcs. They had rough brown skin and large tusks instead of small teeth like the Draenei did. Their hair was usually dark except in their elders, when it was a powdery white or gray. They were very short-lived and the oldest one I had seen had been about eighty years or so, although most of them died before that.

We and the Orcs were peaceful, and occasionally we traded goods. They were kind to us, and lived in separate clans, the most friendly by far the Frostwolves. I do remember that one Orc, Orgrim, from the Blackrocks though. He and his friend Durotan from the Frostwolf clan came to stay with us in our city once. Restalaan, Velen's right hand and most trusted friend, led them through the city. When they were walking down the large path, my little sister turned and smiled at them.

We had been there about two hundred years prior to when they came, and it seemed that after they had grown into adults everything went downhill.

Kil'Jaeden had found us.

He was using the Orcs to hunt us. He corrupted them, made them into brutes, turned their skin a sickly green, and their eyes shone bright red even in the afternoon sun. They were a horrible sight to see, and soon they invaded our towns and cities on a mission to exterminate the Draenei race. Kil'Jaeden had led them to believe that we were plotting against them - and convinced them that killing us was the only option.

After the frenzy of the Orcs, barely any of us remained. They were convinced that they had exterminated us, but the truth was that some of us were hiding. Some of us escaped. My family remained, except for one person.

Durotan had killed my little sister.

She had clawed at him at screamed at him and I had watched as his hammer came down on her skull, spattering blue blood on the path where she had once politely smiled at him. Blue blood and skull fragments and little bits of brains, everywhere.

I am not going to write any more about that.

But, after hiding in fear for what seemed like an eternity, the Orcs had constructed the Dark Portal. The portal would take them to a nearby planet called Azeroth, where creatures called Humans, Dwarves, Gnomes, Elves, Trolls, and Tauren resided. All of these creatures looked alien to us, but I can just imagine how strange we looked to them!

The Orcs poured through the Dark Portal like a filthy, green waterfall. We were glad they were gone, and we were glad we could protect Velen for that long. He is not enfeebled, but he is still pretty old.

We stayed in a place called Tempest Keep, which we had constructed out of the little bits of our ship that was left. However, the Dark Portal was two-way. A race called Blood Elves led by an awful man named Kael'thas Sunstrider came to us and tried to take over our settlement. Since our numbers were small, we could not fight back, so we took a wing of Tempest Keep called the Exodar and flew away with it. Well, "flew away" is not an ideal term, but I will use it for lack of a better one.

We tried to go back to our home planet of Argus, but along the way our engine went haywire and we crash-landed on the very same planet that the Orcs had gone to.

Azeroth. Az. Er. Oth. It sounds strange to me, but I'm sure Draenor sounds strange to the other races we reside with now. I suppose that's why they call it Outland now. But that new name sounds stupid, in my opinion. To me, it will always be Draenor.

Exile's refuge. Hah, it wasn't much of a refuge after all, now, was it?

The Exodar crashed on a little island called Azuremyst Isle. Sadly, we wither mutated or infected most of the living things there, and even some of the non-living things.

Okay, I'll stop there. The rest of this story is a detailed personal account of what happened to me after we landed. One major political thing happened, though, and that is that we joined the Alliance, which, as its name perceives, is a tight alliance of Human, Dwarf, Gnome, Night Elf (they were hunted by the Burning Legion before we were), and, finally, us. On the other side of the war, called the Horde, were a loose alliance of Orc, Troll, Forsaken, Tauren, and Blood Elves that were not lead by Kael'thas.

At the time I am writing this, we have each found new allies - Worgen for the Alliance, and Goblins for the Horde. But this short story takes place in the past, like most do; these races will not be mentioned. Unless, of course, there is a funny story involving a Goblin - we all know that if you talk to a Goblin you will be suckered into giving away all your belongings as well as being sold five thousand gallons of orange juice and half a spoon. But that is a tale for another time.


End file.
